Caporegime
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- 1 Dec 2010
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- 53,766
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- Welling, London
I’ve donated to adblocker. That shows where I stand on the issue.
How would you fix digital advertising?
- Thread starter Marmot
- Start date
Soldato
- Joined
- 18 Oct 2012
- Posts
- 8,352
youtube has a fair balance, not too intrusive 5s or 50s ads relatively infrequently.
i do go with adblocks non-intrusive advertising, i didnt used to bother but the incessant videos that would randomly play INTRODUCING NEW CILLIT BANG WITH EXCESSIVELY LOUD AUDIO BECAUSE **** YOU THAT'S WHY and the occasional "whoops the skip button broke here's an hour long ad for ya", i mean seriously who makes an advert that freakin long?
i also dislike the recent business with the likes of the "adpocalypse" on youtube with the main advertisers forcing a lot of good content producers out of their revenue just because they have a channel that doesn't fit with their brand, turns out google didn't have the balls to turn round to them and say "you don't like x content? fine we'll not show your ads next to x content but we're still gonna show ads and monetise those channels".
so go ahead and call me unethical for running an adblocker, but it's no less ethical than the **** the ad companies pull.
i do go with adblocks non-intrusive advertising, i didnt used to bother but the incessant videos that would randomly play INTRODUCING NEW CILLIT BANG WITH EXCESSIVELY LOUD AUDIO BECAUSE **** YOU THAT'S WHY and the occasional "whoops the skip button broke here's an hour long ad for ya", i mean seriously who makes an advert that freakin long?
i also dislike the recent business with the likes of the "adpocalypse" on youtube with the main advertisers forcing a lot of good content producers out of their revenue just because they have a channel that doesn't fit with their brand, turns out google didn't have the balls to turn round to them and say "you don't like x content? fine we'll not show your ads next to x content but we're still gonna show ads and monetise those channels".
so go ahead and call me unethical for running an adblocker, but it's no less ethical than the **** the ad companies pull.
- Auto playing videos with sound? No.
- Ad audio louder than the video/music you want to listen to? No (I'm looking at you Spotify)
- Ad video longer than the clip I want to watch? No
- Popup I have to hunt for the [X] symbol on when I open a page? No.
- Unobtrusive ad that doesn't get in the way? Yes.
- Short videos (like YouTube does with an option to skip after a few seconds)? Yes
Something like that
Soldato
- Joined
- 10 May 2004
- Posts
- 13,057
- Location
- Sunny Stafford
C'mon lad. Someone showed me a YouTube video at work and it had a pre-roll advert. I was like "where is the video?" and she said it's an advert. Lo and behold I later realised that my home PC blocks YT adverts as I had uBlock installed and that I didn't know that YT adverts existed. So as an experiment, I disabled uBlock to see how I'd get on with YT with ads. Unbearable for me imo. A pre-roll ad before the video, 4 banner ads during the video that cover part of the actual video (video was only 10 minutes long), then more video ads after the relevant video is finished.
Sod that. No seriously, sod that. I don't have a TV, so YT is my TV and I pay my internet provider £38/month to access the internet, and that is only on the medium tariff. I don't think that I have to pay extra or see ads to access YT on the principle that I have contributed 180 videos myself on that platform. You gain from the community and you also give to the community.
I am 50/50 on this, but going on the net without an adblocker is akin going into war without body armour.
There is multiple issues here.
Some malware is spread via advertising networks.
There is a growing trend for sites to autoplay videos which is horrible behaviour.
Tracking significantly slows down web browsing, some sites particularly news sites have over 10 domains used for tracking purposes, each of these will require a dns lookup and at least one tcp session opened.
It wastes bandwidth, depending on the device and isp used can be significant.
Its a nuisance when ads are animated, or they move around the screen following your movements.
In the 1990s adverts were a mess, popups, animations etc.
Then after adblockers were made, web publishers started getting the message and were slowly restricting adverts to text non animated adverts, in return the dev of adblocker added an acceptable advert feature to keep these adverts working. People were slowly coming to a happy compromise.
But suddenly in recent years, we slowly going back to the early net with animations, autoplaying videos, large adverts covering big chunk of screen, also boxes that popup when you start to scroll etc. Plus I think tracking has gone completely out of control.
In short its been abused, and as long as its been abused I will filter my internet from it.
Sites I use regularly I do add whitelisting but will only whitelist small non animated adverts and no tracking.
Sites like hardocp/hardforum have funding from patreons I am indeed a patreon on hardocp. FT is funded by subscriptions, some sites survive in other ways.
There is multiple issues here.
Some malware is spread via advertising networks.
There is a growing trend for sites to autoplay videos which is horrible behaviour.
Tracking significantly slows down web browsing, some sites particularly news sites have over 10 domains used for tracking purposes, each of these will require a dns lookup and at least one tcp session opened.
It wastes bandwidth, depending on the device and isp used can be significant.
Its a nuisance when ads are animated, or they move around the screen following your movements.
In the 1990s adverts were a mess, popups, animations etc.
Then after adblockers were made, web publishers started getting the message and were slowly restricting adverts to text non animated adverts, in return the dev of adblocker added an acceptable advert feature to keep these adverts working. People were slowly coming to a happy compromise.
But suddenly in recent years, we slowly going back to the early net with animations, autoplaying videos, large adverts covering big chunk of screen, also boxes that popup when you start to scroll etc. Plus I think tracking has gone completely out of control.
In short its been abused, and as long as its been abused I will filter my internet from it.
Sites I use regularly I do add whitelisting but will only whitelist small non animated adverts and no tracking.
Sites like hardocp/hardforum have funding from patreons I am indeed a patreon on hardocp. FT is funded by subscriptions, some sites survive in other ways.
I wish it was just 10 - I just refreshed half a dozen sites (Facebook, Amazon, webmail, etc.) without any tracking or script protection, etc. over 700 different cookies accessed and nearly as many different domains.
Ok requirements for me to turn off my ad blocker.
1: Adverts should be relatively unintrusive - anything that blocks the content or flashes is out.
2: Adverts should not slow down the browsing experience unnecessarily - if your site takes 30 seconds to fully load on even a 10mb connection due to the slew of adverts loading one at a time, the ad blocker goes on and stays on.
3: Adverts should be silent, I don't want additional unwanted sounds whilst using the computer.
4: Adverts should not use up excessive amounts of data - 500k of webpage should not bloat to 50mb in adverts, nor should it keep loading fresh adverts whilst you are looking at static text with a few images.
And finally.
Adverts should be carefully vetted to ensure they do not carry any nasty payloads - the online advertising industry has repeatedly shot it self not only in the foot, but the calf, kneecaps, thigh, hip, waist, chest and head with it's allowing anyone to submit advertising with no checks on what it actually is, thankfully flash and java are used less now but the clean up from those adverts whilst profitable for those that charged for doing it was not fun.
I only turn my adblocker off on a handful of sites that I know take responsibility for the advertising they show, and only show it direct from the company the ad is about, none of this "we'll show adverts from a broker who will accept them from anyone who can paypal them some cash". Unfortunately most sites, including the largest in the world where they could check the contents before posting advertising for their readers don't care, or can't be bothered to do it because it's not their computers that get infected with malware.
1: Adverts should be relatively unintrusive - anything that blocks the content or flashes is out.
2: Adverts should not slow down the browsing experience unnecessarily - if your site takes 30 seconds to fully load on even a 10mb connection due to the slew of adverts loading one at a time, the ad blocker goes on and stays on.
3: Adverts should be silent, I don't want additional unwanted sounds whilst using the computer.
4: Adverts should not use up excessive amounts of data - 500k of webpage should not bloat to 50mb in adverts, nor should it keep loading fresh adverts whilst you are looking at static text with a few images.
And finally.
Adverts should be carefully vetted to ensure they do not carry any nasty payloads - the online advertising industry has repeatedly shot it self not only in the foot, but the calf, kneecaps, thigh, hip, waist, chest and head with it's allowing anyone to submit advertising with no checks on what it actually is, thankfully flash and java are used less now but the clean up from those adverts whilst profitable for those that charged for doing it was not fun.
I only turn my adblocker off on a handful of sites that I know take responsibility for the advertising they show, and only show it direct from the company the ad is about, none of this "we'll show adverts from a broker who will accept them from anyone who can paypal them some cash". Unfortunately most sites, including the largest in the world where they could check the contents before posting advertising for their readers don't care, or can't be bothered to do it because it's not their computers that get infected with malware.
Certainly makes me wonder, but the post is so far one sided it seems like OP just holds a very strong view with a lot of woeful comments made in it.
Business restructuring can lead to job losses whether you're profitable or not. Blizzard Entertainment recently cut 800 staff in it's WoW team despite record profits in the last year. It's in any businesses interest to regularly look internally and assess their business processes and make required changes if it'll lead to greater success.
Soldato
- Joined
- 21 Oct 2011
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- 22,488
- Location
- ST4
Adblocker stays on, and I couldn't give a single flying **** if it costs somebody money.
would never turn my adblocker off to much malware out there these days and obnoxious adverts that cover nearly the full page, i also use custom blocks to remove the we care about your privacy pageblocker BS and accept our cookie tosh
Keep mine (Ublock Origin) on by default for countless sites, and many custom rules/blocks. But if I like the site a lot, especially if it's smaller, I'll take a look with Ublock off and if the ads aren't an issue as others have said, I'll add exceptions - I got exceptions for maybe 10 or so sites. But yeah, like 99% of the time I try to shut down as many ads and unsightly elements as possible.
not sure I consciously take any notice of ads on Web sites I frequently open in new Window while I'm bored then close them and hope im costing someone money.. I don't mind sponsored videos (I watch a hella lot of YouTube).. Ticktock is pushed so hard its on something I do all the time (don't remember what) must have seen it 100s of times
I'm honestly baffled by the comments of some people here. If there was no advertising on websites, the amount of content you take for granted that would disappear is unreal. Granted, a lot of trash websites would go with them, but all your favourite webcomics, news websites, social networks and search engines would disappear.
So actually I agree with the OP to an extent here. Provided ads are unintrusive I have no issue with them at all.
So actually I agree with the OP to an extent here. Provided ads are unintrusive I have no issue with them at all.
95% of people won’t even share this post
Permabanned
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- 9 Aug 2009
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- UK
That's worth it. The internet was better when the content was made by nerdy individuals rather than greedy companies.
As predicted there were a lot of useless one liners but I'm pleasantly surprised to see some of you were actually keen to engage with the debate, as it is an important one.
Yes.
I couldn’t really deduce much from this single line response. I’ll assume you feel the same way about adblocking as you do about this thread, which is that you’re happy to consume content without contributing anything in return.
Interesting, thanks.
If the ad experience fundamentally changed you would still not want to be exposed to them? Can I ask, honestly, whether you feel annoyed when you see advertising on billboards, buses, Piccadilly Circus etc. whilst out and about? How about in newspapers and magazines? Or is your negative perception of advertising specifically aimed towards digital?
This is probably the most inane response so far. I think you must be trolling? You didn't ask for the article etc to be published? That's like saying I didn't ask for the restaurant down the road to open so I'm fine to go in there and eat dinner without paying. If you don't want to be interrupted by adverts that's fine, but you shouldn't be on the websites.
Great, so if the disruptive element of digital advertising could be removed, you would be happy remain exposed to advertising online?
Can I ask how you feel about pre-roll and mid-roll video advertising? Pre-roll and mid-roll ARE effectively disrupting your experience because you have to wait before you can watch the video you just clicked on etc, but if you're not happy with autoplay and you don't want pre-roll then there aren't many options left for video advertisers. Very few people would opt in to watching video ads unless they were rewarded (with content) for doing so. Obviously video advertising is the primary source of income for YouTube.
If ads had no click functionality would you still be opposed to the ads on mobile? Unfortunately due to the size limitations on mobile there are very few options available to publishers. As for data allowances, I understand this concern however with a growing number of unlimited data plans I think this is less of an issue every day.
Again, I just can't understand this mentality. I just read this as "if I'm ever asked to pay for anything then I won't visit that business again, unless it's life or death"
The scripts are largely due to something called 'programmatic advertising' which is effectively the movement away from contextual placements into audience buying placements. If you're selling fishing rods then you might think fishing websites are the best bet, but keen fisherman don't only browse fishing related content, they also browse holiday content, they also look at lifestyle and entertainment, sport, cooking, and much more. Programmatic has allowed brands the ability to buy the individual rather than the ad slot.
An end to targeted ads wouldn't stop the need to track people either. Brands still want to know where their money is going and senior business stakeholders are not happy with verbal reassurances that their adspend is working, they need quantifiable results. Thirds parties (such as Doubleclick, Sizmek, etc.) are employed to verify that what the publisher is saying is true, and some code is necessary to do this.
Probably a lot more than I would care to admit. I get the point you're making, but I'm sure you don't actually believe that you're not subconsciously affected by advertising, and subsequently display a higher propensity to convert off the back of it. This is the fabric of the industry and it is why 4 of the 5 largest companies in the world derive revenue from digital advertising.
So with that said I'm going to presume that if the industry was fundamentally revamped to become non-intrusive, you would have no qualms removing your adblocker. You don't have anything against 'advertising' but you don't want your day to be ruined.
As a secondary point I would really question what type of sites you are visiting where there are more ads than content? Very occasionally I get sent a daily mail link with a humorous title or such, and yes the experience is awful, but that is once a month maybe. Practically all of the sites I visit these days have fairly conservative ad placements, no autoplay with sound or anything like that at all.
Actually it tells me nothing at all other than you are discontented with the status quo, which I already predicted in my opening post.
Thanks, that's nice and clear.
Maybe you have a slight point as you do contribute directly through content upload, however how does that content you upload pay for YouTubes hosting fees?
Yes.
I couldn’t really deduce much from this single line response. I’ll assume you feel the same way about adblocking as you do about this thread, which is that you’re happy to consume content without contributing anything in return.
Interesting, thanks.
If the ad experience fundamentally changed you would still not want to be exposed to them? Can I ask, honestly, whether you feel annoyed when you see advertising on billboards, buses, Piccadilly Circus etc. whilst out and about? How about in newspapers and magazines? Or is your negative perception of advertising specifically aimed towards digital?
This is probably the most inane response so far. I think you must be trolling? You didn't ask for the article etc to be published? That's like saying I didn't ask for the restaurant down the road to open so I'm fine to go in there and eat dinner without paying. If you don't want to be interrupted by adverts that's fine, but you shouldn't be on the websites.
Great, so if the disruptive element of digital advertising could be removed, you would be happy remain exposed to advertising online?
Can I ask how you feel about pre-roll and mid-roll video advertising? Pre-roll and mid-roll ARE effectively disrupting your experience because you have to wait before you can watch the video you just clicked on etc, but if you're not happy with autoplay and you don't want pre-roll then there aren't many options left for video advertisers. Very few people would opt in to watching video ads unless they were rewarded (with content) for doing so. Obviously video advertising is the primary source of income for YouTube.
If ads had no click functionality would you still be opposed to the ads on mobile? Unfortunately due to the size limitations on mobile there are very few options available to publishers. As for data allowances, I understand this concern however with a growing number of unlimited data plans I think this is less of an issue every day.
Again, I just can't understand this mentality. I just read this as "if I'm ever asked to pay for anything then I won't visit that business again, unless it's life or death"
The scripts are largely due to something called 'programmatic advertising' which is effectively the movement away from contextual placements into audience buying placements. If you're selling fishing rods then you might think fishing websites are the best bet, but keen fisherman don't only browse fishing related content, they also browse holiday content, they also look at lifestyle and entertainment, sport, cooking, and much more. Programmatic has allowed brands the ability to buy the individual rather than the ad slot.
An end to targeted ads wouldn't stop the need to track people either. Brands still want to know where their money is going and senior business stakeholders are not happy with verbal reassurances that their adspend is working, they need quantifiable results. Thirds parties (such as Doubleclick, Sizmek, etc.) are employed to verify that what the publisher is saying is true, and some code is necessary to do this.
Probably a lot more than I would care to admit. I get the point you're making, but I'm sure you don't actually believe that you're not subconsciously affected by advertising, and subsequently display a higher propensity to convert off the back of it. This is the fabric of the industry and it is why 4 of the 5 largest companies in the world derive revenue from digital advertising.
So with that said I'm going to presume that if the industry was fundamentally revamped to become non-intrusive, you would have no qualms removing your adblocker. You don't have anything against 'advertising' but you don't want your day to be ruined.
As a secondary point I would really question what type of sites you are visiting where there are more ads than content? Very occasionally I get sent a daily mail link with a humorous title or such, and yes the experience is awful, but that is once a month maybe. Practically all of the sites I visit these days have fairly conservative ad placements, no autoplay with sound or anything like that at all.
Actually it tells me nothing at all other than you are discontented with the status quo, which I already predicted in my opening post.
- Auto playing videos with sound? No.
- Ad audio louder than the video/music you want to listen to? No (I'm looking at you Spotify)
- Ad video longer than the clip I want to watch? No
- Popup I have to hunt for the [X] symbol on when I open a page? No.
Something like that
- Unobtrusive ad that doesn't get in the way? Yes.
- Short videos (like YouTube does with an option to skip after a few seconds)? Yes
Thanks, that's nice and clear.
Maybe you have a slight point as you do contribute directly through content upload, however how does that content you upload pay for YouTubes hosting fees?
Adverts don't work on me. I ignore 99.9% of all adverts completely and automatically.
If an advertiser is paying to display an ad to me, then they are wasting their money.
I block the ads with an ad-blocker because they often:
1) cause excessive load times on pages. Without ads/javascript, a page might load in <1 sec. With ads the page is still loading 5-10s later...
2) follow me around when I scroll. Full page-width at the top, then if I scroll down, they follow me as a smaller version of themselves
3) start video with sound, often on every page
4) are excessively large - ie the "letterbox" ads on the left and right of your screen
5) are excessively bright, animated, in-your-face. By their nature they scream at you for your attention. By design.
This is not the experience I want from a leisure activity. Imagine you went to a health spa (if that's your cup of tea) to unwax and relind. Now imagine somebody followed you around everywhere you went in the spa, shouting at you to buy coffee, cars, over-50s dating (I'm not even 50 WTF), holidays to Ibitha (yuck). It would ruin it, even if the spa itself was free the experience would be so miserable you wouldn't go again.
Some static adverts on the walls would be fine; some brochures lying around the place would be fine; but the ad industry as a whole is moving towards high-impact, bright, moving adverts. E.g. see football matches, where all the banners are now electronic and all adds are now movies.
I think this thread is well-intentioned but futile. The industry as a whole has chosen HIGH IMPACT IN YOUR FACE LOUD MOVING TRIPPY COLOURS! Perhaps because they see us as low attention span fools or perhaps because, in a world full of advertising, you now need to really jump out/annoy/accost your audience to get noticed.
I don't think things will change for the better - I think if it's possible they'll get worse. So my ad-blocker is here to stay for the moment, but I'm sure eventually ads will be created that it is impossible to block. Like ads that are inserted into the content and served by the site you landed on - not served by a 3rd party.
If an advertiser is paying to display an ad to me, then they are wasting their money.
I block the ads with an ad-blocker because they often:
1) cause excessive load times on pages. Without ads/javascript, a page might load in <1 sec. With ads the page is still loading 5-10s later...
2) follow me around when I scroll. Full page-width at the top, then if I scroll down, they follow me as a smaller version of themselves
3) start video with sound, often on every page
4) are excessively large - ie the "letterbox" ads on the left and right of your screen
5) are excessively bright, animated, in-your-face. By their nature they scream at you for your attention. By design.
This is not the experience I want from a leisure activity. Imagine you went to a health spa (if that's your cup of tea) to unwax and relind. Now imagine somebody followed you around everywhere you went in the spa, shouting at you to buy coffee, cars, over-50s dating (I'm not even 50 WTF), holidays to Ibitha (yuck). It would ruin it, even if the spa itself was free the experience would be so miserable you wouldn't go again.
Some static adverts on the walls would be fine; some brochures lying around the place would be fine; but the ad industry as a whole is moving towards high-impact, bright, moving adverts. E.g. see football matches, where all the banners are now electronic and all adds are now movies.
I think this thread is well-intentioned but futile. The industry as a whole has chosen HIGH IMPACT IN YOUR FACE LOUD MOVING TRIPPY COLOURS! Perhaps because they see us as low attention span fools or perhaps because, in a world full of advertising, you now need to really jump out/annoy/accost your audience to get noticed.
I don't think things will change for the better - I think if it's possible they'll get worse. So my ad-blocker is here to stay for the moment, but I'm sure eventually ads will be created that it is impossible to block. Like ads that are inserted into the content and served by the site you landed on - not served by a 3rd party.
preroll on a video is ok if its like 2-3 seconds max. Or even better use your initiative, if e.g. you have a presenter reading something out on video, put something in view showing the brand name of the sponsor, so its there viewable but also not interrupting the content.
Also if its an advert you already seen same day it should be skipped add some kind of algorithm to detect if you already watched that ad.
Although some may find this hard to accept there is sites out there that exist not to make money but simply to provide content for people out of the goodwill of the owner, I remember the days of the net before it was commercialised that is what the majority of sites were.
Also tracking can be done via simply scanning web logs, and even if you utilise 3rd party tracking why is there a need to use several trackers on a single website? the daily mail e.g. last time I checked were using 8 trackers.
Foxeye what you said sadly has already started happening, I occasionally come across sites that inject code into advertising blocks that is required for the site to function. Usually those sites dont get a repeat visit from me. I treat them like the door salesmen who wont accept no for an answer.
Also if its an advert you already seen same day it should be skipped add some kind of algorithm to detect if you already watched that ad.
Although some may find this hard to accept there is sites out there that exist not to make money but simply to provide content for people out of the goodwill of the owner, I remember the days of the net before it was commercialised that is what the majority of sites were.
Also tracking can be done via simply scanning web logs, and even if you utilise 3rd party tracking why is there a need to use several trackers on a single website? the daily mail e.g. last time I checked were using 8 trackers.
Foxeye what you said sadly has already started happening, I occasionally come across sites that inject code into advertising blocks that is required for the site to function. Usually those sites dont get a repeat visit from me. I treat them like the door salesmen who wont accept no for an answer.
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Permabanned
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- 9 Aug 2008
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- 35,711
Wrong, I am happy to block advertisements because adverts all over is making things worse not better. Sometimes I can't find content due to the amount of ads that are all over the pages. People are forced to have them in their face constantly. If I want to buy something I will, I don't need someone to keep throwing adverts in my face all the time.
Exactly this....
Soldato
- Joined
- 13 Jun 2011
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- 6,053
@Marmot if you want paying for your content put it behind a paywall. If you provide information in a free to view area i.e 99% of the internet, people can do what they want and its tough dodo for you or any other advertisiers.
I will continue to use add blockers for as long as they are available.
I will continue to use add blockers for as long as they are available.